The journey never ends
part 1-
"You need to get beyond Infinity, to realize who you really are.."
So it was finally time, he thought to himself, standing in the shallow water, surrounded by pine and spruce trees. A soft wind was blowing around his naked body, letting him shiver softly, leaving a trace of goosebumps behind on his dark blue colored skin. The white light of the full moon immersed the surroundings in a mystic atmosphere, and you could hear some distant calls from night owls, waiting for prey.
Raktul took a deep breath and slowly closed his eyes. He knew, if he'd take that last step, he'll be finally complete. Finally a fully grown member of his species and he will be able to use his abilities completely. He waited for the perfect moment and slowly began to hum some soft melodies. After a while he slightly opened his jaw and words were formed within the melody, growing in might and volume, every second.
Moments passed and it seemed like every living cell on that small clearing, he was standing at, was listening to his words, which were vibrating over the small woodland pond. His voice was forming an ancient language, he never learned to speak in this life, wrapping everything in an unitary feeling of old wisdom.
Raktul began to relax and let the words flow out of his mouth, unknowing what he was singing, but feeling, that it was right. He could feel himself and all of his surroundings, like he was never able to do before and yet, was totally relaxed, standing in the fresh water on that springtime eve.
The spirits of the water were amused of his singing and slowly started to show up, giving him company and listening to his words. He could feel the energy lever rising fast and kept singing, even if it was getting hard, to concentrate on nothing and everything at once. The spirits began circling around his body in joy, moving faster and faster, leaving just a trace of a foggy energy veil behind. They knew exactly, why Raktul was there, for. He was ready for the pact.
After another short while, suddenly, all of the water souls vanished back into the small pond and the water suddenly shone in an intensively, neon blue color, pulsating of energy. Raktul stopped singing and looked around him, with unbelievable eyes. He never saw anything like this. All the glowing started to move, centering at one point, at his legs, where he touched the water. The circle was laced tighter every second and all of a sudden, the bright light vanished, as it was sucked in, where he stood, and there was a moment of complete silence.
Raktul got a bit uncomfortable. He didn't know if it hadn't been to early to stop the tunes and was a bit scared if he messed things up. Then all of a sudden, strange things where happening.
From his feet, up his whole body, the same, neon blue color filled up the rune marks of his body, like blood, pumping through old veins, forcing their way through.
The feeling was indescribable. It was like a current, flowing through his muscles, electrifying every single cell, not just in the physical body. It was like the whole area around him, was swirling of energy as his body was lightened up with the power of the water spirits.
It felt very delightful, till to the point, when the glowing reached the triangle, on the backside of his neck. The center, where all the runes on his body are emerged from.
He began to scream out in ache, as the energy seemed to try to take over his body in an painful act. He collapsed in the shallow water, bending in distress, feeling like every bone would splinter and every muscle fiber would tear apart. His markings were glowing brightly as they where burning like hell and it soon seemed to come to an end, as Raktul noticed, that he slowly lost control over his consciousness, still cranking in the mud, trying to retain prevalence over his body.
His screams slowly fainted and he felt like his whole body was running thin, flowing right into the water, being one with it, as his vision got darker and he finally lost awareness, lying on the edge of the small forest pond, feeling nothing anymore..
A warm shimmer of soft daylight shone on his dark blue colored face and the sweet sound of chirping birds let him open his eyes slowly. Raktul blinked a few times, as the sun was very strong, still lying on the humid ground, trying to assort his memories, what happened last night. It took him a few seconds, as he remembered in shock, that he was trying to strike up a pact with water spirits. He sat up, grimacing in ache, as his whole body felt like pierced through with hundreds of nails, paralyzing his body with an undying pain. It was hard for him, not to loose consciousness once more of the pain, but he kept strong, trying to keep control over his muscles.
It took quiet a time as he was finally up on his feet again, rubbing his neck, wondering what exactly happened the night before. He looked at his blue, salamander like body and inspected the body runes, he had since his birth and didn't see any sign of activation. No glow, no shimmer, nothing.
. He got angry and let out a roar of despite, as he realized, that the pact hadn't worked. If it had, he'd be on the ship, back home at this moment again, experimenting with his new powers. So he still was too weak, to fully accept the might of the nature spirits of earth, he thought and got depressed, as he realized, that he had to find another holy place with other elemental ghosts, or had to wait to the next full moon, to be able to make a pact with these water souls again, when they were at their full strength. He reflected about it for a moment, kicked away some branches on the ground and finally decided to move on, finding other beings, for his covenant.
He wasn't on any specific route. He just needed to get some miles behind him as long as he was still motivated to move on. With heavy thoughts he sat one foot before the next and marched through the light forest.
After a while on his way through nature's beauty he was able to get some clear thoughts again and had time to think about his family back on his home planet, probably already waiting for his return..
Raktul was a Shapeshifter from Xar'Thol. A planet, not far away from the sun system, where he was now. But without a proper spaceship, he wouldn't be able to leave this place anyway. All the members of his species had the special gift of Shapeshifting but first they had to make a special bond, before they were able to use this gift. They had to find some elemental ghosts and connect with them.
Every member of the Xartholian had to choose wisely, which element they'd prefer. Once bound, it can never be changed anymore and Raktul was sure, that he had to choose water. But now it rather seemed like he erred.
Raktul looked up for a moment and realized that the sun was rather low again and would set to dusk pretty soon. Tears shot in his eyes as the light reached down through the treetops and hurt his eyeballs with a might, he'll probably never get used to it. On Xar'Thol it was pretty dark more or less the whole time. He blocked off the sun with his arm, and got lost in thoughts again, as he saw the rune marks on his body.
All of his race got these rune markings, all over their bodies, except of their front torso, as they were born. It looked like a gigantic tattoo that was stretched all over. In fact these marks were the real magic behind their shifting. The Xartholian weren't able to power up these runes by themselves, so they had to gain energy from external sources to gain the ability to shift into nearly every form they'd prefer.
In the Beginnings there was a lot of war and killing in his homeland as it seemed like the only way to gain these powers, was to deprive the energy from other living beings. But wisdom comes in time and soon they figured out, that war wasn't necessary.
When a member was fully grown and mentally capable of using his powers, he was also able to make a sacred bond with a higher spiritual being. Energy itself, manifested in elemental ghosts, whose only task was to keep peace and balance for a specific place..
Again, Raktul got angry about himself, not to be able to make such a bond. Suddenly he got ripped out of his self destructive thoughts as he realized where he was.
The dusk already started and a bright orange shimmer shone through the woods. He stood, barefoot on some cold mossy stones and there was a tiny creek, burbling his way through the humid forest ground. Raktul could feel some sensation in the air and as he listened carefully he could hear a swooshing, he wasn't really familiar with, but had his ideas about it, what it might be.
With fast feet and new found joy, he jumped his way over sticks and stones and followed the sound, where his ear holes showed him to, up along the small river. The rustling got louder every step and as he traversed through some branches at last, he set foot into a rather magical place.
He stood on a huge stone plateau, on the foot of a gigantic waterfall which was nearly as high as the trees were. The sight nearly touched him to tears. He never saw anything like that and was overwhelmed by that immense sound, only water was capable of doing, just by falling. Maybe he really wasn't ready to fully accept this element when he only knew that little of it, he thought.
Raktul stood there for a few minutes, just watching the scenery astonished and then decided to make his late night camp, not exactly here, but a bit higher, not to get wet through the night.
So he climbed the stones, still admiring the sound of the water and finally reached the top of the waterfall, as the sun was ready to set for the night. There was a beautiful stone plateau as well, just not as big as the one below, but at least as beautiful. From up there he could see over a huge area of the valley, and even saw the sun, touching the horizon, far away
The source of the waterfall seemed to be deep inside another forest but additional, smaller creeks were separated from the main stream and were running down the plateau in little waterfalls as well. The stone area was richly vegetated with all sorts of fern, thick leafy plants and raspy looking bushes.
He was very happy for finding such a beautiful place and decided to spend some more time in enjoying his stay there.
It didn't take long until he found a fitting place for him to spend the night, so he sat up a small camp, but before he went to bed, he decided to take a swift meditation at the waterfall to be able to fully inhale the whole beauty on all levels.
For a short moment he thought about the water spirits. Maybe they'll be gracious and give him their power today, but he soon realized, that the full moon was already over and with it the full might of the water souls. No bounding for him, tonight, but as long as he was able to relax at this place, he'd be more than happy. He will probably find another good spot in the right time.
So he sat down at the cold rocks, near the creek, where the water fastened up for it's free fall and tried to sit as comfortable as he could get. Raktul took a deep breath and watched the last sun rays, vanishing behind the treetops and finally closed his eyes, being open for all the other senses but the seeing.
He just sat there for a moment and listened to the burbling and swooshing sound, finding it extremely relaxing.
It didn't take long, till he fell in a slight trance, where only the moment counts. Suddenly he could feel everything around him. Not just listened to the soft burbling, but rather felt it. It was like he was the water himself and could feel every little wave, and every small branch, that flew softly over the wet surface.
Raktul took another deep breath where he was shortly brought back in real life but got sucked back into trance even faster. After another while it was like his body didn't exist anymore. He just felt all the waves.. his whole body got carried away but with no goal. It was like he didn't even had a beginning nor an ending anymore.. everything was connected so smoothly and nothing was relevant than the steady flow of everything.
He didn't know how much time passed but as he opened his eyes slowly again, still feeling this sensation in his body, something wasn't right.. His legs had disappeared!
Instead there was something like a blue glowing liquid, he was sitting on.. He was transforming!
Raktul ripped his eyes open and couldn't believe what he was seeing. All the runes on his body were glowing like hell! He was something like a neon blue glowing candle, sitting by a creek. But not only shining, his whole body seemed to dissolve slowly into a blue glowing mass, flowing away not as fast as water anyhow.
"It worked!!" Raktul let out a scream of joy and tried to get up, without any success. He tried again harder but still wasn't able to. It seemed like the liquid didn't want to turn back into his normal feet just like that. Panic raised up in his head but he pulled himself together before he got carried away too much and concentrated for a moment, trying to think about something useful.. "Tentacles maybe?"
He didn't even know where this picture came from but in the same second, he saw himself having tentacle feet, the liquid seemed to move and gather around at one point. Raktul watched the process with enthusiasm. There was bubbling and slurping and slowly the mass formed into something.. something new.. something... Tentacle!
Surprised, confused and happy at the same time, Raktul tried to get up with his new pair of feet. Unfortunately his new limbs hadn't any bones anymore and it wasn't that much easier for him to get up. He realized, the runes on his body were still glowing and so he tried something else.. With another deep breathing he tried to concentrate again, which wasn't that easy, as his heart was pounding twice as fast, with all the excitement. But after some time he managed to get his feet into their free liquid form again and manifested his normal, salamander like feet again.
Happy to stand again, he just rested in this position for a moment and admired his whole body. It was the same strong glowing, he had the day before, when he made the bond with the water spirits, before he passed out. So the bond did work after all! He wasn't too weak!
Raktul, more than happy, tried out his new won powers but wasn't really sure what he should transform into. "Ok, take it easy.." he muttered to himself and tried to calm down again. After some more focusing he was able to grow some additional spikes on his whole body and played around with extending his fingers to a maximum and put on spiky endings. He was surprised, how easy the whole thing actually was. He just had to visualize a picture of what he wanted to have and moments later his body already transformed.
He was full of joy and energy and jumped around and played like there were some enemies he had to destroy. He felt very mighty and couldn't really imagine what else he was able to do. So he played around for a bit and soon found out that he wasn't only able to grow additional bones but was also able to generate all kind of tissue, even scales and fur. He felt god like, as he was able to modify his very slick skin into any kind of tissue he could think about, without any after effects. Only his fawn colored belly was hard for him to transform. He was able to change it a little bit, as it seemed that the runes around it, changed it's form a bit. But there were no markings on his whole front torso, making it hard for it to shift in the desired form
After another while of experimenting with his powers he felt an immense pressure in his chest but didn't know where it was coming from. All he knew was that the pressure got better if he'd scream out or laugh loudly. So he continued testing his abilities and tried out what else he was capable of.
All sorts of spikes and razor sharp bones already decorated his body as he still tried to fight some unreal enemies. Raktul took another deep breath and focused all his thoughts again. This time he focused all his energy in his right hand but with no greater purpose. The marks seemed to pulsate like thick veins, and it seemed to work, but he could feel this huge pressure in his chest again. He was able to see a small shimmer in his hand as he moved it behind his head, like holding a rock.
So he leaped up and let out another mighty scream as he shot down his hand, in front of him, like pressing an enormous spear into the ground. Suddenly there was a huge blue glowing explosion and Raktul got thrown back a few meters and landed, not very softly, on the rocky plateau. He didn't really care for that anymore, as he already passed out in the moment of the explosion.
His mindless body got dragged away from the blast wave, some more meters over mud and stones and Raktul couldn't do anything about it. It got thrown through some bushes till it finally crashed on some rocks with an unhealthy sounds. The still neon blue shimmering body just lay there, probably uncomfortable and bruised all over, waiting for Raktul's consciousness to come back..